Is Cara-4.1 Express state of the art?Pending benchmarks.Announced Oct 20, 2026; no independent results yet.
Anam's real-time avatar model, built on Cara-4 to be faster and more expressive, with better lip sync, Director Notes style prompts and wider framing. Live in Anam Lab and the Anam API; open weights not stated.
The details so far
- Lab
- Anam
- Announced
- Oct 20, 2026
- API
- Live · cara-4.1-express
- Open weights
- Unknown
- Lab
- Anam
- Builds on
- Cara-4
- Access
- Anam Lab and the Anam API (avatarModel "cara-4.1-express")
- Weights
- Not stated
Tags marked unsure are not stated on the lab's own pages.
What would let us call it
Verdicts use only independent boards we already track. Two consecutive snapshots are required before any crown.
- Publicly announced with a source
- Usable by the public (API or weights)
- Listed on an independent board we track
- Enough results for a rank in a category
- Holds across two snapshots (crowns only)
What the lab claims
Self-reported. Shown for context; not used in any verdict.
Lab claim: in a blind study of 60 raters, 85% scored Anam higher than HeyGen, 88% higher than Tavus and 92% higher than LemonSlice. The evaluation code is published.
Lab claim: fastest median response time in its study, 1.24 seconds from end of user speech to start of reply.
Sources
LABAnam announcement on Xx.com/Anam__ai/status/2112584252676002208 · Oct 20, 2026LABMeet Cara-4.1 Express (Anam blog)anam.ai/blog/cara-4-1-express · Oct 20, 2026Tracking continues until an independent board lists it.